Love and Marriage
by thisloser
Summary: He would sooner cut out his own tongue than admit it to Gai, but the truth was that Kakashi had proposed mostly for the sake of convenience. Kakashi/Gai marriage fic, crack.


**Title:** Love and Marriage

**Rating**: T

* * *

He would sooner cut out his own tongue than admit it to Gai, but the truth was that Kakashi had proposed mostly for the sake of convenience. Married couples saved a lot when it came to taxes, maintaining one household was cheaper and less work than two separate ones and, most importantly, this way Kakashi wouldn't have to wait for Gai to come around or, even worse, leave his home to get laid. (Gai, ever the traditionalist, refused to shack up before the relationship was "official")

So he bought the ring, invited Gai to a romantic picnic in the forest of death and went down on one knee, then he quickly jumped up to kill the giant monster centipede that had chosen this precious moment to try to steal their onigiri, and then, covered in green slime, he proposed.

Naturally, Gai said yes and proceeded to hug the stuffing out of Kakashi.

As it turned out, giant monster centipede blood made for first-grade instant glue.

~#~#~#~

"We need to set the date," Gai said at the breakfast table the next day.

"Hm," Kakashi answered, never raising his eye from the pages of his book. To be honest, he was a little scared of looking into Gai's eyes, which, ever since the proposal, had been carrying a strangely manic glint that never faded. Not even when Shizune had started snip more or less blindly at the cloth in their glued-together crotch area. With her tiny, sharp, gleaming surgical scissors.

The memory was like nails on the chalkboard of Kakashi's mind.

"I was thinking January 1st, he suggested in an absentminded manner that was all pretense to hide his tension. Here was the perfect date, not only would he never forget it – the New Year's fireworks were a great reminder – no, he could also combine Gai's birthday and anniversary present and thus save money!

Gai blinked, confused. "But that's my birthday." It didn't sound as happy as Kakashi had expected. "And it's in winter; I want to get married in spring, the season of new beginnings!"

"How is New Year's Day not a day of new beginnings? Hm?" he tried not to sound desperate and failed miserably.

"I want to get married in March," Gai said, ignoring him completely. "It's the perfect month! When the snow has thawed and new life begins to bloom!"

Kakashi then made the mistake of meeting his starry-eyed gaze; it was an instant loss.

"Fine." Since it was October now, he figured he could at least enjoy the next few months before the wedding insanity would take over completely.

"Also, " Gai said, "I think that, until our wedding night, we should stop having sex. That way it will be even more unforgettable."

Gai's eyes were so big and shiny, Kakashi thought, like polished obsidian. Feeling that strange, fuzzy feeling inside his stomach again, Kakashi reached across the table and covered his hand with his own.

"Whatever you want," he said, the world narrowing to the two of them.

Then, slowly, Gai's actual words surfaced through the mist of his bliss like bone shards breaking the skin.

"Wait… What? But that's six months!"

~ #~#~#~

"Hakama and haori… flowers… invitations… food… arrangements with the temple… all of that needs to be taken care of," Gai said and produced a notebook and pen seemingly out of nowhere. After a minute of taking notes, he looked at Kakashi critically. "When was the last time you had your hair cut?"

~ #~#~#~

Kakashi stared at the colourful brochures Gai had laid out in front of him without really seeing them. Still, it was better to stare at them than to lift his eye and watch Gai's behind wiggle from left to right and back again with every energetic swipe he made while polishing the kitchen counter.

"Makes your mouth water, doesn't it?" Gai looked over his shoulder and winked at him.

Startled, Kakashi looked up from the photo showing a huge white wedding cake complete with flower decorations and regretted it instantly.

"I can't tell whether this is a stain or a scratch," Gai said, frowning down at the wooden surface for a second before scrubbing so hard his hip began to hit the counter rhythmically.

Kakashi squeezed his eye shut and sobbed into his pamphlet.

~ #~#~#~

"Don't you feel amorous tonight?" Kakashi asked mischievously, brushing up against Gai, who was slightly bent over in order to put on his sandals, just so.

"I do, my beloved, which is why I am going to go relieve some stress and cool off."

"I bet I could help you with that…" He traced one finger down Gai's spine, stopping a millimeter above the interesting areas.  
Gai spun around and caught his wrist, his face schooled into sensei mode, _disappointed _sensei mode.

"We made a heartfelt promise, remember Kakashi?" he asked, then, without waiting for a reply, he left the apartment to go train.

Kakashi followed him into the hallway, not ready to give up just yet.

"What's the big deal?" he said as he caught up to his boyfriend as Gai opened the door."It's not like we haven't had sex pretty much everywhere in the whole Fire Country in every conceivable position a million times already, Gai! So I don't see-"

What he did see then were the three shocked and beet red faces of Gai's students who had apparently been standing on their front porch the whole time and had clearly heard everything he'd just said.

Kakashi smiled and pushed Gai, whose back felt as stiff as a board, out the door.

"Enjoy your training!"he would have called after them, if they had in fact moved away. He said it anyway, and even waved goodbye merrily before slamming the door shut in their faces.

~ #~#~#~

There was a rumor going around that Inoichi-san refused to speak to Gai anymore because the latter supposedly insulted the former's flowers by calling them _not youthful enough_. Apparently the incident had escalated into an argument about the general youthfulness of flowers and how one could even tell that one flower was more youthful than another. Kakashi decided that he already knew too much about the whole incident and that he had better avoid both the flower shop owner and his boyfriend for the time being.

~ #~#~#~

"How are the preparations for the big day going?" Tenzou asked with an expression of such unashamed smugness that it really did make Kakashi want to push him off his barstool.

"Where has my cute little kohai gone?" he lamented instead, "and why has he left this cruel old man in his place?"

"There is this thing called karma… People tend to get what they deserve," Tenzou mused, stirring his drink with one finger-turned-wood. "Also, if I am supposed to be an old man, what does that make you, Kakashi-_senpai_?"

"So cold…" Kakashi sighed deeply. "And here I was going to ask you to be my best man…"

At that Tenzou's whole body seemed to perk up all at once. "Best man? Me? I…" His mouth worked without producing even a single word for a moment. "Senpai," he finally managed, his eyes looking suspiciously shiny. "I would be honored."

Obviously, Kakashi was surrounded by saps.

"Drinks are on you, then," he said and downed his sake in one gulp.

~ #~#~#~

"I wish I could hibernate, the waiting is the worst." Listlessly, Kakashi poked around in his bowl of ramen with his chopsticks, accidentally skewering one half of the boiled egg.

"It is a good strategy for torture," Ibiki remarked next to him, "letting them stew in their own juices for a bit, you know? Their own imagination will do your work for you."

And wasn't that the truth.

Lost in thought, Kakashi traced a vein in the wooden counter while Ibiki rambled on about the art of torture. If being married was going to be anything like the preparation phase, where he was nothing but a slave to Gai's crazy perfectionism, maybe he had better get out while there was still time.

Things sure had been different before.

"Gai and I did it here once after Teuchi-san had closed up for the day," he said mostly to himself, patting the counter like a loyal dog.  
The noodles falling out of Ibiki's mouth and onto the floor looked a little like and octopus scurrying out of his underwater cave and into the endless ocean, Kakashi thought.

~ #~#~#~

He took the month-long A-Rank mission in Lightening not because he had to, but because he _could_. Although he didn't exactly tell Gai that.

All he knew was that in Lightening there were no hours of debating the right choice of Hakama (actually, he would prefer getting married in his uniform), flowers (he could barely tell the difference between them), wedding cakes (he hated things that were too sweet anyway) and so on. Instead there were a bunch of blood-thirsty missing nin on a killing spree, which sounded a lot more enjoyable to Kakashi.

~ #~#~#~

Tsunade didn't make it quite that easy for him, though.

"You wouldn't be running away from your wedding, would you?" she asked, fixing him with her most piercing glare.

"No," Kakashi said because he wasn't, _honestly_. So what if he'd maybe idly wondered what the life of a missing nin might be like once or twice. Who hadn't?

"Good, because you know that wouldn't only affect you, don't you?"

He wondered if there was a secret system to the way she seemed to make everything into a question, and such indirect questions at that.

"I know," he said "and I would never hurt Gai like that on purpose."  
This at least was the truth and nothing but.

"I'm not talking about Gai."

He looked at her, nonplussed.

"I'm talking about the village. No matter what happens between you two, you have to be able work together and protect each other. That's your duty," she glared even harder, driving a red hot poker right into his heart. "Don't ever forget that."

~ #~#~#~

Kakashi dodged awkwardly and at the very last fracture of a second, ramming his arm up to his elbow into his enemy's chest while the other man's katana missed his neck, leaving only a shallow cut across his shoulder that barely made it through his vest.

The somewhat obscene wet sucking noise of torn flesh giving when he pulled free might have been enough to make your ordinary civilian lose his lunch, but Kakashi ignored it completely. He shook blood and gore off in passing as if he was just drying his hand, and avoided looking at the dead man's face any more than he absolutely had to.

He hated the look of naked surprise on that slack face too much. They always looked so surprised.

His hand wandered to his shoulder, probing the tear in his vest to see how deeply he'd been cut.

Just a scratch.

But a little more to the left and he would have been the surprised one. Then he would have had a funeral instead of a wedding. And he would never have seen Gai again.

It was high time he went home, Kakashi decided.

~ #~#~#~

On the home stretch he ran into Kurenai.

"Do you regret not marrying Asuma?" he asked clumsily, sitting opposite her, the flickering campfire between them.

She smiled sadly as shadows danced across her face. Light and darkness chasing each other in her eyes.

"No, because it wouldn't have made a difference," she said softly.

~ #~#~#~

In the end, Kakashi made it back just in time. So what if he almost gave the ancient priest a heart attack when he appeared right in front of him, so what if Naruto and Sakura rolled their eyes in unison, Tenzou scowled, wiping the sweat off his forehead in relief, and Lee started crying then and there, none of that mattered in light of Gai's smile.

"You're late, by 23 minutes and 34 seconds."

"I guess I got lost on the road of love for a while…but then my heart led me back to you." That had sounded a lot less sappy in his head.

Oh well, it was a wedding after all.

~ #~#~#~

_Their_wedding, Kakashi thought, surprising himself with how light-hearted that made him feel. As if his feet weren't even touching the ground anymore.

Until the moment the priest turned to Gai and posed the question, that was.

Because then Gai's face changed suddenly, doubt filling his eyes, which darted to the priest, then to their guests and last to Kakashi, whose heart felt like it was slowly drying up in his chest.

Gai was going to say _no_, he realized, and the amount of pain that thought caused him was unfathomable, he was the surprised one, now. The light in his eye going out forever.

And then Gai said _yes_.

~ #~#~#~

Afterwards, after the ceremony, after the (too sweet) cake, after Naruto's (semi insulting) toast, after Lee had got into the sake and destroyed all the flower arrangements, after they were _married_, they sat next to each other, watching the sun rise. Gai in his haori and hakama, Kakashi in the same uniform he'd worn for the last three days, content in the knowledge that really nothing had changed.

Except that everything was going to be a little more convenient from now on, of course.

End.


End file.
